Browning: Men and Women

Corruption has come to mean decay, moral deterioration, a perversion of someone’s integrity, evil nature, anger or temper or the unconscious accidental alteration of a word. The heart can mean the mind or intellect, the part of ones inmost thoughts and secret feelings, the soul, the seat of perception, understanding and emotions (especially love), disposition, temperament or character. The phrase, ‘the corruption of the human heart’ is a frequently used one.

Its roots seem to come form the bible (Mark 7:21,22) and this corruption is believed, in Christianity to be the basis for sin and any rebellion against god. This is the reason for many Christians that we are separated from god and deserve punishment. (‘And yet god has not said a word! ‘). The corruption in the poems My Last Duchess and Porphyrias Lover can take many different forms such as battles for equality between sexes, a projection of Browning’s own desires or a struggle between different classes.

In this sense I will take the question to mean the souls moral deterioration and how this is shown. If then, during the poems, deterioration happens, it implies that there was a point, perhaps at the beginning where the male speakers were not corrupted. For just as light presupposes a dark and good a bad the fact that the heart becomes corrupt implies that there was a point at which this was not the case. In My Last Duchess Browning manages to create a person who is distant from him. During the poem the speech is only that of the man and so there seems to be no input from browning at all.

The poet seems to want to make it totally clear that this is not about himself and to distance it from him. Perhaps this is intentional for we can see no corruption in the way the poet feels because there is no way that we could prove that the monologue is his and his own feelings and not the dukes. In porphyrias lover Browning once again creates a character who is speaking in a dramatic monologue and who again is very distant from browning himself. One of the main themes, which could be seen as a type of ‘corruption’, is the way in which both men treat the women mentioned in the poems.

In My Last Duchess the duke treats both women (his last duchess and the counts daughter) as objects -meaning both things and aims- and the same is seen in porphyrias lover where porphyria is used almost servant like to lay the fire and then at the end used like a doll. These objects must be beautiful, in My Last Duchess there is an obvious need for physical perfection, the painting showing simply her appearance, the way she smiles or blushes is described and then the countesses daughter is described as ‘fair’. In Porphyrias Lover this is shown much more extremely by the great focus on her ‘yellow hair’ and ‘smooth white shoulder’.

The poems were obviously written in a time when women were seen much more as servants or sexual objects, in porphyrias lover for example there is a great focus on her servitude to him (‘and made the cheerless grate blaze up’) and also her sexuality but still her remaining purity (symbolism of the colour white). This beauty is totally natural, something that both men seem to like but also dislike. They appreciate the women’s beauty but dislike the lack of control they can have over their actions. There is an obvious theme in both poems which show both men to like ‘things’ more than people, simply because non-living things could be controlled.

The bronze of Neptune taming a seahorse in My Last Duchess seems to be portraying the dukes feelings of having created something that now needs taming or controlling (Neptune as ruler of the sea would have first created the seahorse before taming it. ). They feel threatened by life in a sense, the way in porphyrias lover that the weather is threatening to him or her eyes too alive and described as ‘bee(s)’ or in My Last Duchess where he is almost jealous of her honesty towards others or the way she blushes.

Both men see their women as threatening to their power. This could be viewed as a gender struggle in which the men want to regain their power over women and yet the women strive for independence. This is seen best in porphyrias lover where they speak of ‘vainer ties’. Therefore the men in both poems represent mankind and in the same way the women represent women as a whole. The women are placed in a position of servitude (‘made the cheerless grate blaze up’) and also submission. (‘She too weak’), both things that give the men the majority of the power.

In My Last Duchess the duke seems unable to change her (like the bronze of Neptune) fearing that in doing so he will lose his power and control (‘e’en then… to stoop’). He wants her to be ‘perfect’ and in his mind perfect means beautiful yet easy to control. It is hinted that he has killed her (‘I gave commands then all smiles stopped together’) therefore creating something perfect in his mind. The same seems to be true in porphyrias lover where her jealous lover kills porphyria. The death in porphyrias lover seems much more symbolic than the death in My Last Duchess and she is strangled by her hair (a symbol of femininity).

It appears that it is her femininity then, and her need for independence or ‘vainer ties’ that has caused her death rather than the man. It seems that he is without blame for we are told that ‘god has not said a word’ and makes no moves to punish him. One of the obvious benefits that both men see from the death of their ‘women’ is that they are now able to control them. In My Last Duchess the curtain over the painting allows him to control who looks at her and also who she looks at. In porphyrias lover he controls her by opening her eyes and propping up her head.

Another theme that could be viewed as a type of corruption is the struggle between classes. It is made clear that porphyria belongs to a different (possibly higher) social group to her lover, as it is obvious that she is unwilling to leave them for him (‘and all in vain’). Her hair is described as yellow, which cannot only be a symbol for potential danger but also a symbol of riches or money. In this way it could be interpreted that she was strangled by her own wealth, the amount of wealth may be represented by how many times the hair went round her throat and how long it was. ‘Three times her little throat around’).

In My Last Duchess there appears to be a social divide in that the duke feels that the duchess should be grateful for his ‘nine hundred year old name’. This implies that she should be grateful to him for marrying her and allowing her to become a duchess (again like Neptune and the bronze). She is killed because she is not grateful enough of the sacrifice he had made for her and at the end it is shown that he is choosing to marry a richer woman than his last wife (‘the count … disallowed’). I am unsure of whether this preoccupation is demonstrated in the poems.

It looks as if it should be simple and that as two women were controlled and murdered by their partners there must have definitely been a type of corruption. However I do not think that this is the case. If corruption is the root of sin and sin is punishable by god then surely both men must have been punished because of their obviously corrupt actions. We are told, however, that this does not happen. Browning makes it clear that god makes no moves to punish the men especially in porphyrias lover (‘and yet god has not said a word’). Therefore there cannot be corruption if god does not see the need to punish the men.

Also the murder in porphyrias lover seems to be more a crime of passion and of love rather than a cold-blooded murder. In this way then the person is killed because of love. How can the killer be corrupted if his main motive is one of love? The heart itself is the seat of emotions and feelings especially love. The statement is proved to be false because if the heart was corrupted it could not possibly feel love, definitely not strong enough to kill because of it. I am not convinced that the poems do show the ‘corruption of the human heart’ because the men in the poems seem to be nothing greater than inadequate.

I think that they do ‘bad’ or corrupt things because they are simple not because they themselves are corrupt. The speaker in My Last Duchess tries to give an impression of himself as inadequate which is not a true representation of his own inadequacies but an attempt to cover up his true failings. He says that he has very little skill in speech (‘even had.. have not’) and this seems on the surface to be true, however in the passages where he seems to be rambling he uses heavy punctuation to articulate his point.

I do not believe that this is what a person with as little skill as he portrays would be capable of. He does seem a rather subdued and introverted character although I have very little to back that up other than the tone of the poem. He gives very little information about himself and although he seems to want attention it is not for focus on him but for his ‘things’ and possessions, his painting, nine hundred year old name and bronze. He seems to think that possessions give him power and this does seem the case, ‘I gave commands then all smiles stopped together’.

I think that his wife’s death is as a result of his own fear of powerlessness and his own attempt at taming her (once again like the bronze). I do not think that he intended it as a horrible murder as he seems to speak about her quite affectionately (‘I call that piece a wonder’). In the same way I do not believe that the man in porphyrias lover intended to kill her out of spite or cruelty. I believe that he was too simple to be able to see another way of handling the situation. The rhyming scheme is much more obvious in this dramatic monologue and the language seems much simpler.

I think that the speaker has an almost childish mentality in its simplicity. He sits inside the house and describes the outside world in a way that makes it appear very threatening to him (‘the sullen … lake’) porphyria then enters and makes the fire and cheers up the cottage. She begins to take control, which he seems incapable of doing. In a very forward manner for the period porphyria ‘made her smooth white shoulder bare’ and ‘put (his) arm about her waist’. He does not seem to know what to do with her. I think that he does not know how to ‘experience’ her beauty.

If he touches her or sleeps with her then he is not experiencing her beauty but her sexuality. He does not know how he can preserve her or how he can feel her beauty. In the end he ‘found a thing to do’ and kills her. Into about the final third of the poem the rhyming scheme becomes even more simplistic and so does his use of language (‘rosy little head’). Here he tries to experience her beauty making her eyes open and her cheeks blush. He seems pleased with this but her remaining traces of life still seem to scare him, her eyes are described as ‘bee(s)’ or something dangerous inside something beautiful (‘as a shut … tain’).

I therefore conclude that there are traces of corruption in both dramatic monologues but that neither poem shows a definite theme for ‘the corruption of the human heart’. Human hearts cannot be totally pure and good so there will always be a degree of corruption in humans. As I believe the crimes to be ones of love and also stupidity I cannot say that these are corruptions as they are both parts of the heart in the beginning and not things that are seen as the result of corruption.